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Zone 1
Zone 1 is the second Zone that can be accessed as well as the third location encountered in the game. In the the world of OFF, Zone 1 is very important given that it is used for the production of all essential raw materials, in the form of elements, to send to the other Zones. It is solely responsible for almost all of the five elements, being the source of smoke, metal, plastic, and meat. The only element not encountered there is sugar, an element that is only produced and encountered in Zone 3. A large group of Elsen, who make up the population and workers of both this and other Zones, have had their work sites plagued the corrupt spectres. The Batter, at the will of The Player, travel through the various areas, performing various tasks along their quest of purification, before finally facing Dedan, the Guardian of Zone 1. Areas Elsen Elsen is the first area in Zone 1 that the player enters when they exit The Nothingness. It seems to be made up of little more than a tram station, though buildings are seen in the background. There is also a red save box there. Two Elsens can also be seen at the station, although one is on the other side of the tram and cannot be spoken to by normal means. Damien Damien is where the player learns about the first of the four elements, Smoke, which people need to breathe. The Batter will also encounter the first Add-On, Alpha, have his first Spectre battle, and encounter his first yellow save box, which doesn't allow him to return to The Nothingness. The miner at the entrance asks The Batter if they are an inspector. Damien mainly consists of a smoke mine, where the Elsen release smoke from the Earth to form the air they breathe. Much of the smoke is bottled and sent to the other zones. None of the characters, including The Batter, appear to object to this, which points to how very few of the OFF world's residents are human. The Player and The Batter begin the Zone 1 part of the game traversing areas around this mine. Smoke 1.png Smoke 2.png Smoke 3.png Smoke 4.png Smoke 5.png Smoke 6.png The Elsen will explain that the mines are filled with aggressive spectres, but due to safety regulations, The Batter is not permitted to enter. He will instead give The Player and The Batter the task to kill the Chief of Spectres inside the Annex Tunnel. Inside the Annex Tunnel will be The Judge and the circular Add-On known as "Alpha". Alpha appeared in the Annex Tunnel for one reason or the other, where the Elsens mistake it as the Chief of Spectres. The Judge will explain that he was just passing through and is perplexed by the newly discovered Add-On. He then will persuade The Player into adding the Add-On to The Batter's party. After Alpha joined The Batter's party, The Judge will tell The Player and The Batter that the Chief of Spectres is not in the Annex Tunnel, forcing them to return back above ground. The Elsen from before will ask The Batter about the Chief of Spectres as soon as he is spoken to, whereas The Batter will tell him that the Chief was not there. The Elsen will be distraught, but allow access into the mines. There will be several Elsen both outside and inside the mines, mainly clustered around the entrance. Past the entrance of the mines, The Batter will reach a room with only a yellow save box. The Batter will then freeze, and say: "Show yourselves, corrupted children! I'm the voice of forgiveness that'll eliminate your calamitous forms." After this statement, 8 spectres will appear in a circle around him and attack, beginning the first battle between The Batter and Spectres. Once the battle has been won, it is possible to continue right to go deeper into the mines. The almost maze-like structure of the mines has many dead-ends, some with chests containing Jokers and Belials' meat. A common spectre that attack in this area are Magnolias. There is also a secret room in the mines where three of the Elsen are holed up in, presumably after the spectres began to appear, behind a secret door that is opened via a button in the one light that happens to be off in the bottom-most hallway. Near this hallway is the ladder that leads to Pentel, beginning the next section of The Batter's journey through Zone 1. Pentel Pentel contains vast farms, where metal is harvested from cows into balls which, for some unexplained reason, seems to form in their bodies. The rest of the cow is cut into strips and served as food, as one would expect from livestock. The high quality metal is used for tools while the lower quality is used as the earth upon which the Elsen walk. The barn itself finds itself infested with spectres, which the Elsen are quick to send The Batter to deal with due to the short tempered Dedan expected to inspect it. Shachihata This area is primarily made up of one large office building, where forms are filled and orders sent out for shipments of plastic that is used to make the "water" of the world in liquid form, or tools in solid form. The actual origin of the plastic is relatively unknown, and is only said that The Queen is the supplier of it. The building itself consists of 100,000 floors and a basement, where a lone Elsen has taken for an office space, due to the other floors being full. The Elsen at the ground floor doesn't seem to recall what floor number the Postal Office is on, although some of the Elsen on the first floor seem to know since they bring it up as they're referring to their stamp numbers. The Elsen in the offices appear to be completely devoted to their task at hand as they have little to say other than repeating form and stamp numbers. The Batter comes here looking to purify spectres and meets The Judge on the roof, who tells him of a puzzle to reach the correct floor. Dedan is met in this area. Alma This area is the home of the Alma Meat Fountain. Meat is bottled there and sent to other districts. The work of the Elsen there is to bottle the meat before the fountains overflow. Navigation through Alma is supplied through pedalo boats, which look like large toy ducks. The Elsen in this area are particularly prone to stressing out and becoming Burnts, possibly due to the urgency of constantly having to prevent the fountain from overflowing. The pathway to Dedan must be followed by a pattern and, much like the Lost Woods in Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, can be solved by listening to which entrance the music is the loudest. Trivia * The Elsen on the other side of the tram in Elsen can be spoken to by using noclip or opening the game's file in RPG Maker 2003. He will say: "If you are reading this, then that means you have the power of noclip. Help Dismal find his fruit cup. That is all." * When the Zone is purified, the floating blocks will be missing, and the train will be gone. You need to walk along the tracks (with a possibility of a Secretary encounter.) * The association of the area with four elements that are often harmful to human health, with smoke, metal, plastic, and meat (especially raw meat, as seen in the game), acts as foreshadowing for the chronic corruption that's seen in the Zone as well as later Zones. It is also possible that this hints at Zone 1, along with the rest of the OFF world's locations, being artificially created by the child Hugo (either in his own mind or in association with his environment), someone who is physically very ill as well as too young to understand how actual farming, mining, etc. works. * Despite the fact that all endings to the game feature the death of Dedan and the collapse of the industry production in Zone 1, the Batter is able to move on to later Zones and encounters characters that seemingly are unaware that the moving around of goods has stopped. This may be because of the unclear nature of time in the game, with transport and the delivery of news from one Zone to another taking a while. * While the Elsen find themselves helpless before the spectres, the motivations for the Guardian Dedan for ignoring the threats is unclear. He may be himself corrupted in some way, or perhaps he neither cares about the ghostly beings nor is willing to take the effort to do something about them. Gallery Damien.png | Train station in Damien Damien-1.png | Map of Damien overworld Alpha Discovery.png | The first appearance of Alpha. First Specters.gif | Spectres appearing to attack The Batter in the mines. Pentel.png | Train station in Pentel Shachihata.png | Train station in Shachihata Alma.png | Train station in Alma Map 02.jpg | Concept art for Elsen's layout Map 03.jpg | Concept art for Damien's layout Map 04.jpg | Concept art for Pentel's layout Map 05.jpg | Concept art for Shachihata's layout Damien.jpeg | A poster print of the Smoke Mines of Damien done by Mortis Ghost. This poster can be bought at his store.|link=https://tictail.com/s/mortisghost/a3-zone-1-print 2-001.png Category:Zones